Sunday, March 31, 2013

All the pieces are in place. Everything I planned to put in -- more than I planned, actually. I thought I'd need three new chapters, but ended up writing five more. I probably cut 20 thousand words, and added 10 thousand words.

But for now, this is the book. I want to read it over the next four days, smooth out the rough edges and inconsistencies.

I like it. I like it more than any book I've written. I like it so much, I'm going to set it aside and come back later in a few months and give it another look. And if need be, I'll do it again and again.

It's structured ambitiously, I think. Flashback chapters that are inserted according to theme and mood, rather than logic. In fact, the whole book is about theme and mood.

I've now got so much backstory that it's probably hopelessly
confusing. It isn't confusing to me -- hey, I came up with it. It's perfectly clear to me. But I
wonder if the flashbacks are too much, and if they are too much out of order.

There
is almost enough material to put the flashbacks in sequential order. It's
something to contemplate during the layoff period. It would probably
require more plotting, and it would lose some of the thematic structure
I'm trying for -- the idea of memory and loss. It might be more readable, but it would lose some depth, I think.

But I wonder if it's a book that I'm always going to like more than other people are going to like it.

It's
perfect for the internet, in a sense. That is, it will have to be
found and those who find it and stick with it are the people who
probably should find it and stick with it.

It's the most ambitious book I've written. I mean,
I've tried for drama and for tragedy and for comedy and a love story and
a straight ahead myth/fantasy story, with archetypes. I've tried to
fancy up the language, even put in a fair amount of poetry. I've made
the structure all over the place and I just hope the feeling and the
themes and the characters carry people through.

But I started off years ago with the feeling that I wanted to write the book I wanted to write and screw whether anyone would ever like it. So...I guess I still feel that way, after starting the rewrite with the intention of making is more accessible.

I don't know. Maybe I'm just being self indulgent.

It's a book I'll put out someday. And expect no one to read. And still feel proud of it.

LATER: I read the first 2/3rds of the book last night, and it worked!!! Even the sappy chapters I was worried about worked, because they were interspersed with flashbacks. The flashbacks worked, as well.

I found very few inconsistencies, and what I found I was able to fix easily. I suspect this will be more of a problem in the last third of the book as the story narrows to a conclusion. But so far, so good.

The only real concern was that the flashbacks are moving steadily toward the beginning of the story, while the story moves to the end -- so it is a little like they cancel each other out. So I'm not sure what it does to the momentum.

But it didn't bother me -- just the fact the I read 133 pages in once sitting with no problems -- even though I've been working on the rewrite for a couple of months, is a good sign.

I was amazed it flowed so well -- because as I was rewriting it, I was doing it in parts and selecting where to put the flashbacks by feeling, so I expected it to be a little disjointed. But don't think that happened at all.

In fact, I'm wondering if another rewrite will even be necessary. I'm in no hurry, so I'll tinker with it, give it another read in a few months, but basically -- as I said before -- this is the book I wanted.

I was worried about whether I was wasting my time doing this -- but the end result fully justifies it. It was the typing that was hard -- and I'll never have to do that again, thank god.

So there it is. Yet another book. Damn.

LATER:

Read the last third of the book and it all works. Amazingly.

I had thought it would need much more work, but I'm not sure that's true. I mean, I still set it aside just so I can come back to it with some perspective, but really, I think it's ready now.

Saturday, March 30, 2013

A horror publisher had "open" submissions, so on the spur of the moment, I sent him Death of an Immortal.

He wrote back: "I read the first few chapters of your book and I really liked it. But..." "... I had a tough time
selling Best New Vampire Tales, so I think Death of an Immortal would be
a struggle. Sorry about that."

It's a rejection, but at least it's a personal rejection.

Vampires are passe, is the way I interpret that.

I think the first rejection a few months ago from an agent really hurt because it was so impersonal. I was really doubting myself. Had I completely lost my mojo?

I think Death of an Immortal is pretty good, actually. But I haven't had enough people read it, frankly, to get much feedback.

Early feedback was stuff like "good job" "way to go" -- which is pretty non-committal. Sort of like saying,

"How did you like the book?"

"It was interesting..." (Interesting good? Interesting bad? What the fuck does that mean?)

So I've gotten that second response now from a person I didn't know -- but also people who read that sort of thing. And both said they "really liked" it -- translation, they liked it O.K.

So I'm encouraged.

Hey, it doesn't take much.

I think, generally, I'm just more comfortable with the old fashioned publishing business. I trust in third parties who don't know me to give me a fair hearing -- I've always done well in the past on that basis, when I gave them something worth reading.

So I have to trust that if I give them something worth reading, that I'll get a fair hearing -- probably fairer, actually, than people I know. That's kind of the way it works, I think. Too much baggage.

I have to be ready for rejections if I go that route -- form rejections.

I'm thankful that the internet is there to put my books on if all else fails.

But I have a weird faith I'm going to get published again.

Anyway, I'm going to send the same publisher "Nearly Human." The book I've been struggling with. The first book I tried to write when I came back to writing -- and which I love the idea of, but had trouble getting it right.

The "High Concept" of the book is really top tier. But my execution of the idea is in doubt. Still, I've worked on it so much that I think it's time to expose it to the world and see what the world thinks.

I feel like I just need one step -- one small success -- which I can leverage into getting an agent.

Until recently,
I was watching the show, The Following. But ultimately, it think it's
an example of a story built on a premise that doesn't work.

I mean, really -- a cult leader sending his followers out to kill people? That would never happen!

O.K..... Well, in this case it's more like proof that real life can be stranger than fiction.

For
this show, I just didn't buy it. These aren't mindless Manson zombies,
but highly functioning, cunning, meticulous planners -- who outsmart
the full F.B.I. at every turn.

They are followers of a
failed writer, whose ideas about Gothic romance they are captivated by.
(Begs the question of -- if the writer's ideas are so powerful he can
gather followers to kill for him -- why did his book fail?) He sends
them out to kill and, not so incidentally, to make Kevin Bacon's life as
miserable as possible -- not sure which is more important to him, actually.

Problem is, as I see it, most romantics aren't psychopaths and most psychopaths aren't romantics.

So
it is up to the show to try and prove the writer can be so seductive
and charming and manipulative, that he can entrap not just one or two
followers -- but dozens. (Note to F.B.I. -- every follower so far
visited him in prison. Just saying...)

They've got a
charismatic actor -- James Purefoy -- but they really don't convince me
he's able to convert these followers. (Especially through prison glass
-- hey! I think I'll follow this guy, who's serving multiple life
sentences! Okay, again a case of real life can be stranger than
fiction.)

The show also has Kevin Bacon being Kevin Bacon -- which is always entertaining.

The show goes all in on
the premise -- but I just couldn't quite suspend my disbelief. And I'm
a fantasy buff. But I insist that there be internal consistency. (I
couldn't watch 24 for the same reasons...)

It shows the
importance of having an initial premise that works. If that doesn't
happen, nothing you do -- good acting, plotting, camera work, etc. will
save you.

I'll buy the most outlandish premise -- but you have to convince me, you have to make it work.

Terrill waited in the car outside the Hardaway
residence.A woman was cooking in the
kitchen, an older man had returned home in the last half hour, and the there
was a light on in a second story window. Terrill saw the shadow of
someone walking past the window. They were all home. What was
keeping him rooted to his car seat?

He got out, slammed the door. The neighborhood was
quiet. Everyone in their place. Once he would have found it an
ideal place to feed -- pick a house at random and slaughter the
occupants. It still amazed him that for hundreds of years he had never
questioned it. Humans were food, and vampires ruled the night.

A cat ran across the sidewalk in front of him, giving him a
startled glance as if only seeing him at the last second. Terrill could
stand there, still and quiet, and most people would walk right by him without
seeing him. It had once been one of his favorite techniques -- let his
meal come to him.

He took a deep breath. Walked up the sidewalk, and the
three concrete steps to the door. Still he hesitated, almost turned
around.

He was the murderer. He was the cause of their
grief. He hadn't wanted to do it, he was ashamed, but nonetheless, he was
the reason their daughter would never come home. What right did he have
to stand at their door, to enter their home, to talk to them, to offer them
condolences?

The door opened before he could knock, and a young girl
stood there staring at him.

"Can I help you?" she said.

She looked like Jamie, but then again, she didn't look like
Jamie at all. In fact, she looked like no one he'd ever seen since
ancient days. Her nose was too long, what once would have been described
as a Roman nose. Her eyes were wide set and large. Her chin was
slightly pointed, high cheekbones and wide tall forehead. Thick raven hair.

She looked like she'd come off a Greek urn, he
thought. Every little piece of her was a little off, but the whole was
stunning.

"I..."

"What's he want?" the old man's voice was
gruff. He appeared to be in his seventies, which meant he was already
near sixty when he'd fathered this girl. It was 6:00 in the evening, but
Terrill could tell he was already drunk. He pushed the girl out of the
way.

"What do you want, buddy?"

Jamie and Sylvie's mother followed, dishrag in hand, looking
as though she hadn't stopped crying in days. It was hard to see either
daughter in this beaten-down woman, who was in her mid-fifties, limp brown
hair, and heavy jowl.

"Is this the home of Jamie Lee Howe?"

"Not anymore," the man muttered. "The
slut is dead."

"Howard!" the woman pleaded. He turned and
glared at her until she looked away.

"I'll take care of this, Mom," Sylvie said, and
the old woman moved away, drifting over to the sink and picking up a dish,
taking a few swipes and then not moving, staring out the window.

Sylvie pushed her way to the door again, and stood next to
Terrill and waved him down the steps.

"We can talk out here," she said.
"Mom's in no shape to talk about Jamie, and Howard doesn't have anything
to say."

"Fuck you," Howard said. "I'm watching
a show..." He stumbled away.

"He actually does care, in his own way," Sylvie
said. "He did everything he could to keep Jamie in town, but she
didn't want to stay and she was old enough to make her own decisions."

She didn't say anything else, but stood staring at him
frankly.

"I..." again, his voice faltered.

"You knew her, didn't you?" she said.
"I can see it in your eyes. You're sad."

"Yes..." he said. Then realized he hadn't
planned on admitting it. "I mean, I met her a couple of times."

"Met her?" From her tone, Terrill realized
she knew what Jamie had been doing in Portland.

"For business. She came to me for a life
insurance policy. I represent Prestigious Insurance."

"Oh," she was obviously disappointed. Then
she realized what he'd said. "Insurance?"

"She wanted to make sure that you were provided for --
a college fund, as it happens."

"We've already got the five thousand from her savings
account," the young girl said. "It came in handy, we were late
with the mortgage. Howard lost his job a couple years ago and the
unemployment checks have stopped coming. His social security isn't
enough."

"Well that's just it," Terrill said, more and more
sure he was doing the right thing. "This payment is contingent on
your going to college. It can't be used for anything else."

She didn't look happy or unhappy. She just stared at
the ground for a few moments. "That's too bad -- because I'm not
leaving Mom until she is in good shape. Which may be never..."

"I'm sorry. The terms are quite specific -- the
money can only be accessed as long as you are in college."

She shrugged, and looked at him with a lopsided smile.
Her goofy demeanor and classic good looks were irresistible. Jamie was
right. She needed to get out of this small town.

"You can't live their lives for them," he said.

"That's what Jamie always said. And yet, that's
exactly what she did for me, despite me telling her not to."

She would have had every right to ask him what business of
it was of his, but instead she again got that curious look in her face.

"You knew her for more than business, didn't you?"

He didn't say anything, but the answer must have been
written in his face. She laughed, and it was as if she didn't have a care
in the world. A delighted laugh.

"I knew it! You're just her type, all doomed and
gloomy."

He tried to think of what to say. ‘Yes, I was screwing
your sister. For money?’ That wouldn’t do.

"Don't worry. I know what Jamie was doing -- but
knowing her, she was trying to be more than just...a..."

"She was more," he said. "To me."

"Yeah, that's Jamie. Making every job the most
important job in the world, whether it's babysitting or flipping hamburgers or
being a...being a whore."

He stared at her wonderingly.

"You're wondering how I can say that. You're
wondering why I'm not crying, why I can still laugh. Well, Mister,
someday I'll cry. Maybe I'll never stop crying, but not now. "

"She talked about you," he said.

"Oh, let me guess. Her brainy sister? Her
amazing sister? Well, Jamie always was a little starry eyed. I'm
not like that. Jamie just got unlucky, that's all. She met
the wrong guy at the wrong time. It happened, and now I have to take care
of Mom. And Howard, even Howard. He isn't a bad guy, just sort of
pathetic."

He could see she wasn't going to change her mind.
Time for a change of plans. "She made me executor of the
policy. It says that you have to stay in school, but doesn't say where or
for how long. I'm sure we can find a way."

"You sure you can't just give me the money?"

If I have to, I will, Terrill thought. But having
gotten a good look at her parents, he suspected that Sylvie would end up seeing
very little of it.

Friday, March 29, 2013

Rather dramatic announcements of 15 new businesses downtown in the Bulletin.

Which is weird, because I wasn't seeing it. Looking a little closer, I'd have to say there's little spin going on here. Some of the businesses haven't arrived, as in they don't even have a name -- such as the "smoke shop." There's also an unnamed restaurant going into the Common Table space. I'm going to wait to list businesses that don't have names yet. I will add both of these to the list when I have their names.

Others were announced quite a while ago, and were on my mid-January post. (Drake, Sweet Saigon, Brickhouse).

I've decided that the point of this list isn't to be breaking news, but a confirmed list of street level downtown businesses. It's my own definition of downtown and street level, admittedly. Studio Shen and Revive Skin Services don't appear to be street level. If they are, I'll add them later. On the other hand, I did list Bluebird Coffee Company, which is an inside business, because I've included these types of businesses before.

I suppose the differences is -- a coffee shop is what I call retail, whereas 'service businesses' inside of buildings don't do much for the retail atmosphere of downtown.

My list, but I'm trying to be consistent in an inconsistent world.

I've known about Soba going out for some time, but as long as they had a sign in the window saying they were going to reopen, I didn't feel like I could list them. I also added Volt to the "goings" list. Not to be negative, but it ought to be pointed out that in most cases, a new business means that someone else left.

So the number of businesses that are opening that are named and confirmed and new and street level is six -- which is still a significant number.

Thursday, March 28, 2013

I've arranged for six straight free days to whip Sometimes a Dragon into shape. Linda is out of town, all dental and otherwise appointments are done, I'm letting my guys take care of the Spring Break crowd at the store. Close the curtains, lower the lights, and think and write and write and think.

So the danger is I'll dawdle too much.

At the same time, I'm afraid of putting too much pressure on myself.

The trick is to apply myself, but lightly. I'm going to let the mornings go, drink coffee, browse the internet, read the paper, fix a lunch, etc. Then I'll get dressed and sit down around 1:00 everyday and give myself over to it.

But without pushing too hard. That is, keep my head into the book but not scare myself off.

I'm now seeing that I had a six month spurt of creativity that was probably unusual. More or less three books were written, at least the first draft. Rewrites were done on two other books. Then I got caught up in the actual process of putting them online, and that kind of derailed me.

Then again, I'm not sure I could have kept up that pace forever.

So the plan now is to get a readable copy done of Sometimes a Dragon over the next six days, then set it aside.

Then start a new book.

For the first time, I'm not adverse to sequels. Death of an Immortal has an obvious avenue for a sequel. The Lore books are meant to be a trilogy. Nearly Human was originally meant to be a series. I think I'll probably eventually pursue all three, but also let myself write something else if that comes to me first.

Death of an Immortal came out of the blue, and more or less wrote itself, and I just went with it. Same with Freedy Filkins. So that isn't something I should ignore. If somethings tugs on my sleeve, I should follow it.

I'm thinking I probably needed a break from the creative flow -- give myself a chance to recharge.

I also don't want to dive into a new book without a little thought. Sometimes a Dragon has taught me -- again -- as did Nearly Human -- that having a plan keeps me from writing myself into the proverbial corner, so the next step for Lore is to actually plan the world a little more, even do a little research. Have an idea of where I'm going before I start.

Which is a switch in strategy dictated by experience. I'm not as worried now that I'll do an outline and then not write the book. But ... we'll see.

Wednesday, March 27, 2013

Took the chapters 5 through 7 of Sometimes a Dragon to writer's group. It was just three middle aged guys, which was a little embarrassing since I was reading a couple of sappy love story chapters.

Still I saw it as an opportunity to test the sappiness quotient. Sure enough, it was a little much, especially the poetry, but Ken had the suggestion that I counterpose the danger from the outside by making the viewpoint character show more of the contrast. Keep the sappy, but surround it by the dangerous.

Ken, who I met at the store and who is helping me to improve the cover of Death of Immortal, said he 'liked it' -- and he seemed to mean it. "It's the kind of thing I read," he said. "It's as good as some of those other ebooks that are getting so much attention."

So that was encouraging.

Meanwhile, the cat Panga been meowing all morning as she has finally realized after 5 days that Linda isn't here. I'm no substitute, obviously. Don't hug right, don't brush right, don't prepare her food right.

Tough.

Expecting a busy day at the store, what with Spring Break and three shipments arriving. Just reminding myself to take it easy, that all that pressure to get the shipments out for sale is my own pressure and to step back whenever it gets to be too much.

Finished off the bad tooth stuff yesterday. Took only half an hour to put in permanent filling. Kept the cap -- which was the expensive part. Didn't even need novacaine. That's one of the more wonderful feelings in the world -- to think you have a couple hours of shots and drilling, and instead it all gets done in a flash.

I now have caps on all my back teeth except one -- which is broken and scheduled to be replaced next month. At least I don't seem to get cavities anymore. Knock wood. All this comes from stress at the store -- grinding my teeth for a decade or so really did major damage.

At least I don't seem to be grinding anymore, thank god.

The downtown situation is a little strange. If I was posting rumors, I could get my list updated, but I'm awaiting official confirmation of things.

For instance, my understanding is that Soba is gone and the place next door which is owned by the same family it taking over the space. But there is a sign in the window that simply states its being renovated.

Also, though while the vacancy rate is low -- it doesn't account for the still impressive turnover. Nor do I think the rent rates are significantly lower than the boom years. My sense is that the rates maybe dropped something like 15% or 20%, while sales for many downtown stores probably dropped twice that much. Sales have probably recovered about half that much, and rents have gone up at twice the rate as the landlords realized they could get it.

So, in terms of ratios, I believe we probably have it worse now than we did then.

No way to be sure. But that's my feeling. The building across from me has turned over again and again, and the landlords always seems to have someone waiting to take the space. No reason to lower rent, I guess, unless you want stability. I'm not sure all landlords care about that, as long as they're getting paid.

Tuesday, March 26, 2013

She would pretend to be impatient, but secretly she was
delighted. The last time, she had seen how Mr. Horsham had looked her
over, as if trying to see how she looked with her clothes off. She had
just been waiting for another excuse to be alone with him.

She read everything about him there was to be read, had
followed him to nightclubs, and even snuck in a few times, watching from a
distance as he handed out tip money like it was water. He liked the
girls, that's for certain. Tall, willowy blondes. Such as
herself. Well, such as herself after going to the salon every two
weeks.

She checked a hand mirror. The Horsham estate had
almost no mirrors -- actually none that she'd ever seen. She had a few
too many dark roots to be perfect, but not bad. Blond and beautiful and
young.

He was older than his official biography, she'd
decided. Not that he showed it. No, he had one of those tall, lean
bodies that never got flabby and dark lustrous hair that never greyed or grew
thin.

But the news stories just went too far back for him to be
only 40 years old or so.

He had to be lonely, possibly even depressed. He never
got out of the house until after dark, slept all day. It was time he had
a woman take care of him full time.

The paperboy -- actually a middle-aged man -- finally showed
up.

"The truck was
late," he muttered, and she believed him because he'd obviously been
running, sweat dripping off his fat face.

"It best not happen again if you want your bonus,"
she snapped. Mr. Horsham paid bonuses that were bigger than his wages, if
you pleased him. She planned to please him very much indeed.

He wasn't up when she got to the kitchen. His meal was
laid out, but the light under the bedroom door was still dark. She looked
around at the curtains. Wouldn't it be nice if they were open when he got
up, catching the last vestiges of the day? She went to the window, but
she couldn't see anything that would open them. They seemed almost
permanently attached. How strange.

"What are you doing?" The voice was guttural,
unlike the smooth tone she was used to hearing from Mr. Horsham.

He was in the shadows, wearing a bathrobe. He seemed
to have ...an erection. She flushed. She thought she was prepared
for anything, but now that the moment had come, she felt uncertain. His
silhouette wasn't quite right, as if he was wearing something on his face,
something that protruded.

Nevertheless, she pirouetted prettily, a move she'd
practiced a hundred times in the mirror at home. She had a great body, and
she knew it.

"You have the perfect body."

She couldn't believe he said it. She'd dreamed of him
saying that, but not like this.

"Why thank you, sir. It is at your
service." There. She said it. A little more bluntly and
crudely than she'd planned, but then again she hadn't expected her boss to be
already aroused when she said it.

He stepped into the light. He was wearing a
mask. A fright mask of some kind. Not funny at all. He seemed
to be running toward her, why would he be doing that? She tried to
plaster a smile on her face, opened her arms.

As he got to within a few feet, she saw he wasn't wearing a
mask. She couldn't move.She
couldn't scream. She slammed against the dining table, and fell to the
floor.

Then he was on top of her, ripping her clothes off.
Violating her. She had dreamed of this, of being ravished. But
there was nothing sexy about it. He was grunting or something, nuzzling
her neck. Biting her. She tried to push him off. She'd
changed her mind. She didn't want sex after all. She didn't want to
be here. She'd sue him, instead.

But she could barely raise her arms. He continued to
bite her, and she felt liquid flowing down her neck and chest. Had they
spilled the orange juice? He was sloppy, disgusting.

He reared up as he came, and she saw his face one last
time. The face of a monster leering down on her. He cupped her
breast, and leaned over and took a bite out of it. The pain was somewhere
in the distance, happening in another time and place, to someone else.

The light dimmed, and she could no longer see him, only feel
him -- eating, eating.

She had the perfect body. Just the right proportions
of meat and fat. He tried to hire his servants that way, figuring it
never hurt to have a walking pantry full of meat for emergencies. She had
no family, few friends. Otherwise, she wouldn't be working for him.

When he was finished, he took what was left of her and
stuffed her down the special disposal he'd had installed in his kitchen.

He'd warned her. She'd been skulking about for months,
even stalking him on his nightly rounds. She'd almost been his meal
several times, but he preferred not to kill anyone who could be connected to
him, whenever possible.

But this had been necessary. She had broken one too
many rules of the house. She'd dared to research his past. It was
only a matter of time before he disposed of her, one way or the other.
This had been nice. It was a little early, only a few days since
returning from Scotland, but sometimes he needed a little booster.

It wouldn't cause any problems. It had been years
since he'd eaten an employee. Didn't want to do too much of that, they
tended to notice. But no one would doubt he had fired Vicky -- and no one
would miss her; she had been a little bitch to everyone around her.

He turned on the laptop, washing down the taste of her with
orange juice. A red flag immediately popped up. He read it and
picked up his cellphone.

"Sanders. Get Twilight ready for a trip to
America. We'll stop in New York tomorrow, and fly on to the west coast
the next day. That's right. No, not California. Portland,
Oregon.”

Less than an hour later, he settled back in his seat, the plane's
blinds permanently shuttered since a jet plane could fly from darkness to light
in minutes. At long last, a hint of
Terrill's location. Nothing more than a hint, but it was more than he'd
found in decades.

It didn't matter how long it took, Terrill would pay for what
he’d done.

"They are food, Horsham. Nothing else.
Don't forget it."

They had waylaid a stagecoach, taking the money.
That's all that would've happened if one of the men hadn't gotten foolish and
taken a shot at them. The bullet hit Terrill in the shoulder, and they
were both fell upon the occupants of the coach in seconds. Ripping them
to shreds. It was a snack, nothing more, both of them having fed the
night before.

One of the humans was a little girl, and Horsham hesitated
-- just a second -- remembering his own daughter at that age. Terrill
tore into her, and she was dead in seconds. By the time he was done with her,
his bullet wound was completely healed.

"Don't you remember being human at all?"
It was possible that Terrill didn't remember, since he was many hundreds of
years older. Since the disappearance of their Maker, Michael, he
was perhaps the oldest vampire on earth.

"I remember hating myself and everyone around
me. I remember being beaten, and working from dawn until dusk, going to
bed hungry, whipped when I didn't work hard enough. I remember going back
and tearing the overseer's head off, but not before I had taken my time eating
just enough of him to keep him alive. I remember never having to answer
to another being again."

"Even Michael?"

Terrill laughed. He never seemed to have any
doubts. He reveled in his existence, did as he pleased, but had an eerie sense
of how far to push it. Michael the Maker had advised to Horsham to
follow Terrill.

"The bastard is a survivor, I'll give him that,"
Terrill said, was strangely subdued.

Michael had been quiet for years now, eating only when he
needed to, the rest of the time holed up in his library reading book after book
about human philosophy and religion. It was strangely disturbing to
Horsham. To all vampires. What was he doing? Why was he
acting this way?

When Michael had simply disappeared one day, no one had
been surprised. Perhaps he'd just grown weary, had walked out to greet
the day's dawning. Or perhaps he had gone to ground, only to emerge
centuries or millenniums later. He'd done it before.

Michael had been a kind of Mentor to other
vampires.

Terrill felt no such obligation. He led by example,
and it was a bad example for most vampires who followed his aggressiveness
without his uncanny sense of self-preservation.

"The fewer vampires, the less they notice us.
The less they notice us, the better," Terrill said, when Horsham realized
he was now the third oldest -- second oldest? -- vampire. Horsham almost
never felt fear, but when his traveling companion (he wouldn't say friend) said
this, he felt a tinge of trepidation. Not only wasn't Terrill following
the example of Michael by helping his kind, he was working actively for their
doom.

Horsham almost broke off from Terrill at that
moment.

He would always regret that he hadn’t.

The private jet landed in New York and refueled.
Horsham lost about four hours of night, which was too bad. They landed
in Portland five hours later, losing another couple of hours of night. It
was mid-evening, time enough to get a late meal, but not do any business.

He booked a room at the Benson after midnight, and then went
on the prowl, getting a sense of the town. He got back before dawn, and
slept the day until 3:00 p.m. It was a dark day, drizzling, so he bundled
up and ventured out.

He got to the Portland police station just as the day shift
was ending.

Detective Brosterhouse was getting ready to go home.

"Please, Detective. I flew all the way from
London just to talk to you."

"What's your interest in the case?" the Detective
had already taken off his coat and sat back down at his desk.

"I've been following similar cases in England. I
wanted to follow up, see if it matched the details."

"What do you want to know?"

There was a skeptical look in the human's eyes.
Horsham realized he hadn't thought it through sufficiently. He'd expected a
bored civil servant, going through the motions of solving the murder of a
prostitute. It was obvious that this Detective Brosterhouse was fully
engaged. Horsham had given him a false name, a Mr. Harkins, Private
Investigator, and showed him the false I.D. in case anything went wrong.
But it wouldn't take long for a real detective to discover who had arrived in
Portland from London on this day.

"I'd like the see the crime scene first, if I
may..."

Brosterhouse shrugged. "Sure. Room 221 at
the Travelin' Inn. Costs 35.00 bucks a night, but watch out for the
bedbugs. They bite."

"Could I perhaps entice you to lead me through
it? Everything you've found?"

"We've found almost nothing. The only thing
interesting about this case is how much interest there is in it.
Normally, the murder of the prostitute only grieves the family, and half the
time not even them. First that cop from Bend, and now you. So what
is it about this case that interests you?"

"Cop from Bend?"

"The victim was an old girlfriend of his..."
Brosterhouse said. "If Carlan hadn't most likely been in Bend when
the murder occurred, I'd have bet anything it was him.I still think it might have been."

Bend was a nearby town, apparently. Horsham had a
strange inkling that there was a connection. The mighty Terrill, terror
of Europe for centuries, vicious and remorseless had stopped killing many years
before. He'd disappeared.

Why? What had changed? Horsham remembered
how Michael had been at the end, seeming almost regretful. But most of
all, he remembered how he himself had once begun to doubt the killing of
humans. How Mary had changed him, until...

Horsham was aware of the irony.Once, Terrill has been a vampire’s vampire,
and it was Horsham who had doubts, who had regrets.Once, it was Terrill who killed
indiscriminately, and cared for no one and nothing, and Horsham who looked for
villains, and who had cared for the innocent and the weak.

With one act, Terrill had changed Horsham forever.Without Mary, Horsham had lost all interest
in humans.It was perhaps ironic that
Terrill had changed, that they had both changed – but it didn’t matter.Terrill must die.Nobody, human or vampire, would stand in the
way of this end.

So now, unexpectedly, Terrill had fed again. If it
was true that Terrill had somehow grown a conscience, what would he do?

Horsham remembered his own response when the human he loved
was murdered. Suddenly, he was certain what Terrill would do and where he
would go.

"The girl was from Bend?"

"Newly arrived in the big city. A lamb to
slaughter.'

"Let me buy you dinner, Detective. Tell me what
you know."

Brosterhouse sat behind his desk like a statue.
Massive, ponderous. He nodded his head once. "It couldn't
hurt. This is about as cold a case as it could be..."

The policeman took him to a steak house, where Horsham
picked at an overcooked hamburger while Brosterhouse gave him all the
information they had. Which wasn't much. Which wasn't really
anything at all. Except for one detail.

"She was untouched, except for the puncture
wound?"

"Yeah, it was weird. Someone laid her out and
wrapped her up like he gave a damn. Drained her of blood and then treated
her gently. Sicko, weirdos, creeps. There are all kinds, all
kinds."

The detective didn't have much more information than
that. It didn't matter. That wasn't the real reason Horsham had
enticed him out of the police station. Horsham didn't leave
witnesses. Where he went was nobody's business -- especially a cop who
seemed a little too curious.

They headed back to Brosterhouse's car, and as they passed
an alley, Horsham grabbed the huge policeman like he was a little child and
threw him into the filth and darkness of the alley. The cop was
florescent to Horsham's eyes. He saw the big man trying to see in the
darkness, drawing his gun quicker than Horsham expected, firing a shot and
getting lucky, hitting Horsham right between the eyes.

Horsham stumbled away, running further into the alley.
He could take any wound, as long as he fed quickly, but a shot to his head was
enough to weaken him, and he ran rather than continue the fight. He'd
come back when it was all over.

A couple more shots came his way, but both missed him.

At the end of the alley, he found a homeless man leaning
against the bricks and Horsham drank his blood in seconds. He kept going,
not stopping to feed further. Staying in darkness, using every instinct
developed in centuries of hunting, he made his way back to his motel room
without anyone seeing his blood-splattered clothing and smeared face. He
fell into bed, still weak. The bullet had fallen out in the nightmarish
journey, but the wound to his head still made him dizzy. He'd need a few
hours to recover.

After that, he'd get out of town. The detective would
be looking for him. The whole Portland police department would be looking
for him.

But when Horsham didn't want to be found, he was nearly
impossible to track.He'd find out where
Bend was, and hope Brosterhouse didn't remember his curious questions about the
town.

Monday, March 25, 2013

I have a closed-in backyard. I have high ambitions for my garden. I try to improve it just a little each year, but it's slow going. But eventually, I may have both the design and the plants in place, all flourishing, all looking good.

And no one will ever know except me and my family and a few friends.

Because it's a closed-in backyard. And yet, I don't doubt I want to do it. I don't doubt that it has value. Every spring I get excited about improving the garden, and it fades during the spring and summer, becomes hard work, so that by fall I'm always asking why I bother?

Writing books is a lot like this to me. It's possible no one will ever see what I do. But I still get excited at the beginning of every project, which slowly wears off as the problems mount, until I ask myself why I bother?

Writing and gardening are long-term projects. They can seem overwhelming and insurmountable sometimes. Sometimes they are a hard slog. But they have their little joys interspersed.

I also see the store as a parallel. The big difference -- which I noted right away after buying the store 29 years ago -- is that whatever creative decisions I make have an immediate impact.

Then again, the overall impact -- the making of a living wage -- was a long-term project that seemed overwhelming and insurmountable and often I asked myself why I bother?

All these doubts have come to the fore with Sometimes a Dragon. I ask myself whether I should try to improve the book or could improve the book. It seems overwhelming and insurmountable. Why bother?

Like the store -- like the garden -- I just have to do the work, and hope the rest follows. Just keep writing and trying to improve and look for opportunities. For instance, a tweet mentioned that a horror publisher was taking open submissions, so I sent them Death of an Immortal. Why not?
I don't expect them to take it, but it doesn't hurt to try.

I just have to keep working on the garden every year -- I'm probably a decade away from having something that might be worth bragging about.

I just have to keep working on my books -- and I may be a decade away from having something worth bragging about.

Sunday, March 24, 2013

I finished up typing up the digital copy of Sometimes a Dragon. It's about 20% shorter than before.

It's also a bit of a shambles.

Again, when I ask myself if it's any good, I get the feeling that it might be really bad. But I still want to finish it. It's bad for all the right reasons -- ambition, stretching my abilities, trying to give myself permission to write what I want to write, giving it over completely to my subconscious.

So I still want to save it.

First thing I'm going to do is take a week or two to get it in 'readable' form. That is, if I got hit by a bus in the near future, the story could still be put online in a form that I could stand behind.

But I also think this book can be improved, probably by a lot.

As I've said before -- It's twice as good as before, and halfway to being good.

I was never completely satisfied with the original premise of Sometimes a Dragon. The premise was just good enough to let me tell my little love story adventure with the theme of writing as magic (never spelled out.)

"Just good enough" isn't good enough, obviously.

What I've come to understand in my latter career is that the original premise dictates the motivations of the characters and the motivations dictates the plot.

Linda pretty much thrashed the original premise when she rewrote the first third of the book and I went along with it. Now, in the final third of the book, the premise is completely wrong. Now the motivations of the characters are muddy and contradictory.

So I'm in weird position of having to go back and create a premise that accounts for everything in the book.

It's a bit like coming to a conclusion, and then going back and finding evidence to back it up.

At least with writing, the conclusion is intuitive so it is O.K. to find the reasons to back that up -- as long as it makes sense.

So I've been struggling with this for days, and then today -- in the shower -- the solution suddenly came to me.

This is some kind of miracle. I'm always amazed when it happens. Then again, I'd tried a couple of dozen premises on for size before this one actually fit.

So now, in the next rewrite, I'll be able to work out all the kinks in the plot and the character motivations and make it all one piece.

I actually think the restraints of having to match the premise to existing material sparks some creativity. It will add another layer of meaning to the story. Not so much that I need to explain everything, but that I understand what is happening in my own story.

I think Nearly Human could use a little of too. Some mulling over what would make the premises stronger and the motivations clearer.

I'm pretty sure other writers don't have this much difficulty with things.

Saturday, March 23, 2013

I can give you one good reason for the explosion of ebooks in the world -- the difficulty of writing a book is only a fraction of what it used to be.

It was really, really hard to write a book in the old days. Typing alone was a huge pain. I mean, misspell a word and you had to go back and whiteout the error and retype. A very time consuming process.

Typing my book into digital format has been an excruciating, slow and onerous process.

It was so much worse when it was a typewriter. (Heck, paper and copying costs alone could make you a starving writer.)

You thought long and hard before you started rewriting a manuscript. Sure, you could mark it up and cut it up physically, but eventually you had to type a readable version, and in so doing, you were more or less saying "This is it."

Or not. If not, you had yet another typing job to do.

So I truly believe that many people, while maybe inclined to write a book, found the physical process too demanding. Especially since the monetary rewards, then and now, were not great. Especially with the uncertainty that anyone would ever like it or even read it.

I'm not saying this is a good or bad thing -- just that it explains why there are so many more books now.

The Hardaway residence was in the trendy west side of Bend,
only a block from the Deschutes River. The house was small, probably
owned by the family for generations. Updated bungalows surrounded it, but
it still possessed its original particleboard siding, warped by the infrequent
rains.

Terrill had driven by it the night before. A big
screen T.V. seeming to take up half the little living room, a couple of old
couches, and an older couple ignoring each other at the far ends. It was
nearly midnight, too late to knock on the door. No sign of the daughter.

He felt restless. He drove out east of town, feeling
vulnerable from the lack of cover, trying to get used to the openness of the
terrain in this part of the country. He got back to the motel room, as
dawn was already breaking, and the sunlight ready to stab down on him.

It was mid-October, but the sun was shining brightly all
day. Terrill chose the queen size bed farthest from the windows and tried
to get some sleep. He'd be up at the break of dusk -- his internal clock
would wake him automatically; trained by centuries of needing to feed at first
possible moment.

He turned to his side, remembering Jamie.

They were naked on top of the bed, one of her legs and
one of her arms draped over him.

She was languorous. Something about her appealed to
him. He decided to please her, to make her want it. In return, she
was confiding in him, and for some reason he was willing to listen to this
young girl who had almost no experience of the real world. She had a kind
of wisdom, though. An inner perspective that came from some deep well of
goodness.

Jamie talked glowingly about Bend, and especially her
younger sister.

"Sylvie will get the chances I didn't," she
said. "She's incredibly bright -- math and science and all that
stuff that I never could understand. She just needs a break."

"That's why you're here?" he asked. ‘That's
why you do what you do?’ He didn't ask.

For the first time, she seemed a little defensive.
Before, she had seemed if not happy in her work, at least content...if not
content, resigned.

"I've already put five thousand bucks into her
college fund. That never would've happened working at Burger King."

She was so young, so unspoiled. But he'd sensed
right away that she was a wide-eyed girl in the big city. That's what had
attracted him to her.

"It's not too late for you, surely."

"Yes," she said. "It is."

Terrill knew America was full of such young people, in
deadend existences. Most weren't aware of it, but for some reason, Jamie
had already scoped out the future and decided it was hopeless. He wanted
to object and to tell her anything was possible. But he knew that she
hadn't even finished high school, that she had no skills and had to rely on her
beauty. Even that was beginning to wear off, though she was in her early
twenties. Where could she go? What could she do?

Her grammar and diction were adequate -- nothing
more. Her clothing sense was that of a girl playing at being a
sophisticated woman. She would be limited even in her chosen profession;
at best, forced to pick up strange men in bars. At worst...he shuddered.

Once he had fed on such dregs of civilization, knowing
they wouldn't be missed. But that way of existence was behind him
now. Maybe he could help this innocent young girl, make up for some of
his past. It would be a small step, but in an immortal 'life', such small
steps could add up. Already, he had quietly used his wealth to help other
humans in return for small kindnesses.

"Go home, get married, have a life," he said.

She shook her head. "I attract the wrong kind
of guy. Always have. I'm not going to be like my mother, marrying
five times, each guy worse than the last..."

Terrill said nothing. If she survived her dangerous
and unhealthy profession, she would probably end up exactly like her mother --
marrying the men who paid attention to her, not questioning their motives,
excusing their bad behavior, secretly believing she didn't deserve any better.

"Sylvie doesn't have to be like that," Jamie
continued, as if reading his mind. "She can go to college,
get a good job. Wait for the right man to come along."

He must have been frowning, because she playfully patted
him. "I'm sorry. You don't need to hear all this. But
if you ever met Sylvie, you'd know why I talk this way...”

He didn't answer. It was the rare human who could
pull themselves out of their designated fate. But something about this
young woman's faith in her even younger sister was inspiring. He'd help
make it happen, he decided. At least give them the chance.

He lay in bed with
this young woman in his arms, the warmth of her body seeming to wake memories
long forgotten. Of life, of love and family and everyday existence.
It was strangely comforting.For once,
his hunger left him.Or so he thought.

The windows glowed from sunlight one moment, and then
darkened in the next. Terrill awoke instantly at the cusp, as the ambient
light shifted.

He got up, surrounded by empty mirrors. If ever he was
tempted to forget his nature, he need only rent a motel room, for which mirrors
served as decor. An empty room surrounded him, and empty mirrors
surrounded it, as if he really didn't exist. He only existed in the
darkness and the shadows, which meant he was invisible, night or day.

In truth, he was unlikely to ever forget that. He woke
every evening hungry for blood. For many decades he had been prudent
enough to wake alone. The one time he had forgotten -- the one time he
had felt comfortable enough to let the human stay with him -- had ended badly.

Now this strange trip to a part of the country he’d never
intended to visit, this crazy idea of approaching strangers, to risk his
life. All for a girl he'd barely known, with whom he'd planned a simple
sex-for-money transaction.

But she had not treated him that way. For the first
time in a long time, she'd treated him like a human.

He dressed in a conservative suit, something that wouldn't stand
out too much in a small town where most people dressed informally. It was
the best he could do. He'd never owned a flannel shirt that he could
remember, never even tried on a pair of jeans. In part, he dressed
formally because old fashioned classic clothing offered him more cover -- hats,
gloves, vests, coats, long sleeved shirts and trousers, all gave him a small
advantage over light.

It was also a remnant of his long existence. Clothing
styles came and went -- and he didn't even try to keep up with them.

He stuck his hand in his pocket and felt a burning pain in
his hand. He cried out, and withdrew the stinging object. He
dropped the crucifix out of his hand, but held onto the silver chain, which
hurt him, but didn't burn like the cross.

He stared at it curiously. He'd always been confused
why crosses had this effect. He had no opinion about religion. He
didn't believe in an afterlife -- other than the type he was
experiencing. It was all mumbo jumbo to him. Why should a cross, or
Holy Water, or silver or any other of the many folk wards have any effect on
him at all?

Why question it? Why were any of these superstitious
talismans any less likely than the fact of his own existence?

He touched the crucifix again, and though it hurt, he found
that he could stand the pain. It burned a few centimeters of the surface
of his skin, but went no further.

Without thinking he swung the chain over his head. The
cross bounced off his chest and then settled and he staggered and cried
out. The silver chain cut into the back of his neck, and he had the image
of his head detaching, and bursting into flames. He reached up, and found the
chain digging into the surface of his skin, but lodging there.

The cross burned into his chest and stuck, his skin fusing
with it. It continued to ache, but the sharp pain subsided. He
could stand it.He removed the chain,
because the wounds it was inflicting were visible.The crucifix remained fused to the skin of
his chest.

He'd once fed upon a priest, who when the outer layers of
clothing were removed, had been wearing a hairshirt. The mortal's skin
had been mottled and covered with rashes. His back flayed by
self-flagellation. As Terrill remembered it, the priest hadn't been a
righteous man, but a vicious schemer who used the Inquisition for his own
benefit. So it had surprised Terrill to see that the man apparently had a
religious side.

Or perhaps, sadomasochistic side, since the sadism was more
than manifested by his official duties -- a torturer who tortured himself.

Terrill winced as he put on his shirt. He didn't ask
himself why he left the cross burning into his chest.

He drove to the Hardaway house the minute it became fully
dark. He'd probably catch them at dinner, but so be it. It was
important that they all be home.

He still wasn't sure what he would say. Perhaps
nothing. Perhaps he'd hand over the check and walk away. That's
what he should do. Anything else wasn't safe, either for him or for them.

But as he stood at the doorway, he knew he wouldn't leave
without talking to Sylvie.

Friday, March 22, 2013

So I had the thought this morning to Bing myself instead. And up popped a site in England of a guy listing his 5 Star books, and all three of mine were on the front page. And his comment on Icetowers was: "I bought this when I was seven years old and didn't read it until I was thirty and I loved it."

It made my morning. I was needing something like that.

Every once in a while this happens. A good review, someone getting slightly excited to meet me because they had read my book. (The opposite happens too -- bad reviews, people who read books and shrug.)

I've come full circle on my books. At first I was sky high, then reality kicked in, then I felt like nobody had read the damn things, then I slowly came to realize that what I'd accomplished was luckier and harder than I thought, then to slowly watch as they filtered into the internet world, and finally -- having seen how other have done and are doing -- realizing my books did pretty well, considering.

Thursday, March 21, 2013

I go to book liquidation sites on a regular basis. It really tells the story of book publishing.

I've mentioned before that having an ebook isn't like being a drop in the bucket -- it's more like a drop in an ocean, a vast drowning ocean. But slow books aren't all that different -- it's just a matter of degree. Nothing shows this better than book liquidations.

Now, most books have only a short window to sell anyway. A year from now, even the best-sellers at the feeding trough at Costco will be brought into our used bookstore, the Bookmark, and left in piles.

Most books don't even get that far.

What's interesting about the liquidation sites is the number of titles that are being dumped. I've noticed two types in particular that are eye-opening.

1.) No name books by bestselling authors. These are books that were written either before or after a big book by an author. You'd think that once an author has hit the top of the bestseller lists that they'd be set. Yet there are hundreds of titles you haven't heard of by authors you have heard of.

2.) Types of books are overproduced. What I notice most are young adult books. These seem to have great covers, neat titles, interesting premises. And they go nowhere. Sure, many of them are obviously trying to ride the coattails of a previous young adult bestseller.

Your wizardy kids with glasses.

Purple and black covers, like Twilight.

Dystopian universes like Hunger Games.

And so on. But there are hundreds and hundreds of them. I'd be willing to bet at least some of them were at least as good as the above titles -- maybe better. But we'll never know. Who can read them all?

Had a long talk with a customer yesterday about social networking my books.

I admit, my social networking skills are inadequate.

Finally, I blurted -- "Hey, I couldn't be a standup comedian, either -- no matter how I tried, or how often, or who I listened to. It ain't in me."

So there it is, "It ain't in me."

I'll just keep plugging away and looking for opportunities that I'm comfortable with. So be it.

Wednesday, March 20, 2013

If you have a world that feels good to you, then that's the world you should write. It's more important than that the plot works, or the characters are consistent, or the themes make sense, or the writing is any good.

The 'feel good' is what keeps you in that world, makes you want to make that world come alive -- so all the rest will follow.

I think I finally know what I'm trying to do with Sometimes a Dragon. I've discovered the themes, I've streamlined the plot, I have more of an idea of the backstory, I know who the characters are.

It's a mess, but I like this world. So I'm willing to keep going back.

At this point, I'm hoping that I'm in more of the incremental improvement phase. I don't mean that to sound trivial, because incremental improvements really add up, as long as you keep at it.

This whole typing the book into digital has streamlined the story, made it clearer to me. There may be major changes yet to make, but I do have an overall sense of what I'm trying to do now.

It's been work -- still is work, because I have a third of the book still to type -- but I feel like this is a book worth saving. It's been my favorite book all along.

I have no idea if it works. I've lost sight of that.

I just know I like this world and these characters, so I want to keep dabbling with it until I get it right.

But I do think, when I've got this version down, I'm going to quit working on it for awhile and move on to other things.

The second book of the Lore series is calling me.

My trilogy. I just have to have a fantasy trilogy. It's just something I have to do.

Tuesday, March 19, 2013

"Officer Carlan,"
Brosterhouse's voice boomed across the lobby. He accented
"Officer" as if to emphasize the distinction between a homicide
detective and a lowly patrolman.

Obviously, the Portland
detective had uncovered the restraining order.

“You left Bend at 6:00
A.M.?”

"Check with my
Sergeant. But, yeah.”

Brosterhouse was carrying a
Manila file, and now as they stood in the lobby with everyone looking on, he
opened it. It was filled with copies of the ongoing dispute between him
and Jamie.

"Can't we take this
somewhere private?" Carlan said, his voice low and even.

Brosterhouse ignored him; he
pulled one of the pages out of the file. "These letters make for
interesting reading. Especially this one -- and I quote: "If I
should be found dead, it will be Richard Carlan who killed me."

"That's bullshit,"
Carlan said, his face growing red as everyone in the lobby, civilian and cop
looked at him. "We just had a misunderstanding. We were
working it out."

"So she ran to Portland
and became a prostitute because you were working it out?"

"She was
hysterical. Crazy. I was on my way here to pick her up."

Brosterhouse stared at him
with an expression Carlan recognized. It was the hardnosed skepticism
that cops automatically turned on anyone they considered guilty.

"If that's true, I
could've arrested you. The restraining order is pretty clear.”

Carlan had always wondered
what he would do if he was accused of a crime he didn't commit. Would he
immediately clam up? Call a lawyer? The rational and experienced
cop inside him knew without a doubt that was the best thing to do. But he
fell back on the same protestations he'd heard a thousand times, from guilty
and innocent alike.

"I didn't do it.
She was dead already."

"Your alibi is
shaky.We know you were in Bend the
night before, but that gave you plenty of time to drive over.”

"But I loved
her!" God, how pathetic that sounded. How guilty! They
always said that, murderers who stabbed the 'one they loved' a hundred times,
who slashed and slashed until the 'one they loved' was obliterated.

"You are no longer
allowed anywhere near this case, Carlan. Go back to Bend. We'll
contact you."

"But I might be able to
help!" Being shut out of the case was an even bigger fear than being
suspected. He needed completion. Jamie had died before he could
talk some sense into her, before she could remove the restraining order and
those damning letters. He had an image of her, on her knees, while he
shoved the letters down her throat. Damn her. Why did she have to
die and leave him to deal with this shit?

From now on, they would
always look at him sideways, even in Bend where they knew him. He'd pass
in the hallway and there would be whispers, and laughter, and shame.
Jamie had done this to him, and now he couldn't change it. He was angry with
her, rightfully so, but even more aggravating was that his anger had no
outlet. Unless he turned it on the murderer, the bastard who had taken
her away before he could get to her and change her mind.

Brosterhouse leaned into
him. He was huge, probably twice Carlan's weight, though Carlan was just
a little below average in size. "If you were a Portland cop, I'd
have your badge. We don't look the other way here, like they do in
Bend. That small town bullshit doesn't wash here. Get out of town
before I throw you in jail for even thinking about breaking the
restraining order."

Carlan felt a sudden
calm. He was a cop. He knew the law. He wouldn't be bullied
like the poor saps he arrested everyday who didn't understand their
rights. He stared Brosterhouse in the eye.

"I didn't do it.
Fuck you."

He walked away, feeling like
he had regained a little of his pride. He knew other cops in Portland,
cops who would be willing to help. Brosterhouse was wrong -- the
"bullshit" wasn't confined to small towns, it was everywhere, big
cities and small, national or international or tiny hamlets. Bastard
wanted to pretend the systems of favors and the protection of your brothers
didn't apply to Portland? Who did he think he was talking to?

Turned out, Brosterhouse was
almost right. Carlan called three of his 'buddies' on the Portland police
force and got turned down by all of them. The first two simply hung up,
the third said, "I never much liked you, Carlan."

Time to pack up and go
home? Use his contacts back in Bend?

There was one more guy he
could try, but he hesitated. It was his emergency escape valve, the guy
he planned to turn to when all else failed.

"Hey, Funkadelic!"

"What do you want, Carlan,” John
Funk's voice was so cold, Carlan almost backed off.

"I need a favor."

"No."

"I still have it,
Funker. I still have the evidence...statute of limitations on
manslaughter is the same as murder. Hell, they might just charge you with
murder. After all the only witness who could testify it was a crime of
passion is me..." He started singing: "Who's got the
Funk? Bop. bop. bop. I got the Funk...Who's go the Funk? Bop,
Bop..."

"Shut up," his
former partner said. "I'm thinking about turning myself in. I
never did like the way that went down. I didn't mean to kill him."

Carlan felt the fish
slipping off the hook. "I know that! If it ever comes down, I
could totally testify to that. The guy deserved it -- raping a five-year
old girl. Hell, if you hadn't killed him, I probably would have!"

There was a long
silence. A sigh. "What do you want, Carlan?"

"I need the evidence on
a current case. A girl found dead this morning in a motel room on the
east side. Name of Jamie Lee Howe."

"Who's the lead?"

"Guy named
Brosterhouse."

Another long silence.
"Maybe I should just turn myself in now," John Funk said.
"Get it over with."

"No, no. Don't do
anything that will get you in trouble. Just...you know, help me
out."

"All right. This
one time. But don't ever ask me to help you again, Carlan. I'll
fucking turn myself in."

"I promise," Carlan
said. Well, maybe he would, maybe he wouldn't. But Carlan certainly
intended to test his former partner's resolve if he ever needed him
again.

"Remember, you
asshole. If I go down, you go down for withholding evidence."

"Sure,
sure." Not the way Carlan had it planned but if it made Funk feel
secure, than so be it.

"I'll call you back,”
Funk said, and hung up.

Carlan stayed in Portland
for another day, hanging out near the phone, watching Judge Judy and the other
judges all day. Law and Order marathons. He had enough time to
think, to wonder why he was trying so hard? Jamie was gone. Nothing
he could do about it.

Truth was, he wasn't as
crushed by it as he thought he would be. Still...he hated that he hadn't
been able to change her mind. He'd been thinking about her for so long
that something else needed to take her place. Revenge fit quite nicely.

The Portland police weren't
moving very fast. Prostitute killings were notoriously difficult to
solve. Stranger on stranger. If the killer used a condom and was
careful, he could almost always get away with it unless they found him weaving
down the road with a body in the back of the car.

It was going to be up to
him, and not the self-righteous Brosterhouse, to solve this case.

"What do you care?"
Funk asked, that evening. "From the files, you were on the verge of
killing her yourself."

"I loved her."

"You don't love anyone.
I remember how you treated women, Carlan."

"Yeah, but I never
killed anyone, Funky. Remember that."

"Only because you've
been lucky." There was a rustle of papers over the line.
"The DNA tests came back early. Kind of weird. They say, not
only can't they identify the perpetrator, they're not sure it's even
human. Probably contaminated."

The two puncture wounds in
Jamie's neck passed through his mind, but he dismissed the wild speculation
instantly. Humans killed humans. Always had, always will.

Only one day and the case
was already going cold. Carlan could sense the Portland police were on
the verge of giving up, putting it on the back burner. As a last
resort, he asked for traffic citations in the surrounding area on the night of
the murder. Even if it was the way they had caught the Son of Sam, most
detectives considered it a Hail Mary pass, too time-consuming with too little
reward to pursue in most cases.

Carlan took the time, spending
most of the night and early morning going through it, and just as he was about
to give up, he came across it. A "Warning" for parking in a no
parking zone on the morning after the murder. A
"well-dressed" man in a late model Cadillac Escalade, sleeping off a
binge in the backseat. He rang up Funk and had him plug the license plate
number into the database, and it came back immediately as being registered at a
motel on the night after the murder in a motel in Bend.By the name of Jonathan Evers.

In Bend. That was too
much of a coincidence, Carlan thought. The Portland cops probably wrote
it off, if they even bothered to check. But as a resident of Bend, Carlan
knew how much someone had to go out of his or her way to reach Bend. It
really wasn't on the road to anywhere important. It was mostly a
destination.

Somehow, the owner of this SUV,
this Jonathon Evers, had begun the morning a block from the scene of a murder
and ended up the following evening in the hometown of the murder
victim.

Carlan hurriedly packed up
to go home. It was three o’clock in the morning.He’d have to convince the motel not to charge
him for the night, but flashing a badge usually did the trick.

One good thing had come out
of the waiting. He'd been thinking about Jamie and her family. His
mind kept returning to Jamie's younger sister, Sylvie. When Carlan had
first started dating Jamie, the girl was only a teenager -- now she was legal.
Twenty-one or twenty-two years old, something like that.

Sylvie was an even more
beautiful woman than Jamie, with the same kind of purity that had drawn Carlan
to Jamie. More purity, actually, since she was that much younger and less
experienced. Jamie had been soiled by the time Carlan got to her -- she'd
lied to him, and it was only after slapping her in the face a few times for her
lies, that she told him the truth. She hadn't been a virgin for years.

Carlan had been willing to
forgive her, if she hadn't run off. But inside, he had recoiled.

The more he thought about
Sylvie, the more he was certain he was that Jamie's death had kept him from
making a big mistake. The younger girl was so much more
appealing.

He'd solve this case, and
present it to her. She'd be grateful, he was sure. She wouldn't be like
Jamie, who hadn’t known when she had it good. Sylvie was the right one
all along.

About Me

I'm Duncan McGeary, owner and/or operator for the last 33 years of Pegasus Books in Downtown Bend, Oregon. These days I'm writing books as well as selling them.
I'm the comic book guy. But even more so, I'm a book book guy. Books of all kinds. Big books and little books, children's and adult, fiction and non-fiction, hardback and paperback and trade paperback and graphic novels. Books with more words than pictures and books with more pictures than words. They are all part of the book world to me, and I love being surrounded by them every day.
I also have a second blog: Pegasus Books, where I list the product coming in over the next week.